The Sky and its Opposite
by Pigeoncracker
Summary: What would happen if shape changers other than were cats existed. This is the story of a generally hated dragon shape changer who was brought into Eragon's time from the dragon elf war. He is supposed to be Eragon's guardian against a new evil Galbatorix has breathed into Alagaesia. After all everything has to have its polar opposite.
1. Prologue

**Disclaimer: I do not own any of Christopher Paolini's characters or books. I just frolic in his fantasy world. **

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><p>That fateful day when almost all of us died. The ending of the dragon and elf war when so many families lost their lives to the elves mysterious cause. I was supposed to protect them. But I failed. The last task of my life, I have failed.<p>

The day started off without anything important happening. Just a normal day of scouting the nests, went off without a hitch. I had always loved flying alone, feeling the wind through my wings and watching the clouds slowly rolling by. It was pure bliss whenever I could get outside. I never was one of the dragons that played with the others. I was never favored and no one could ever find my mother or father. I only had one sibling and even he rejected me. Behind my back, all of them, even the elders, in a hushed chatter called me a freak of nature, called me an abomination.

All because I was a shape changer.

No one knows where all the rest of my race went. They all just died off, with no trace of bodies or blood. They just vanished off the face of the continent. As far as everyone knows, I am the last. But even with all of the resentment towards something that I have no control over, they all stood behind me when the time came.

On a call for a scouting run I immediately volunteered, eager to get out of the orphan nest. The only thing out of place was an odd request to look over the eastern forest. The only response to questioning was to say he was hearing strange noises coming from that direction in his dream. I decided to humor the elder and go over there. More time for me to be away from that horrid place.

The only reason I was here is because I had been assigned, assigned to protect and scout everything near the nest. I had a soft spot for the little ones and couldn't just leave them unprotected. So I willingly stayed just for them.

I have been stuck in that orphan nest for nearly half of my life. The rest was spent in the war. I had so many bad memories from our war with the elves. I was one of their most fearsome warriors. I was nicknamed the deceiver for a reason.

All shape changers have two shapes; were-cats have a human and cat bodies. Were-dragons like me had an elf and dragon shape. I would change and then sneak into their midst, and when they least expected it transform. Then all hell would break loose.

There was only one drawback with changing. Unlike the were-cats I had to change into a much bigger shape. All of the organs moving around and the growing that had to be done. Cats are similar to humans if you look at them side by side. Big difference between humans and dragons.

The change would cause me an indescribable pain to course through my body. It was like going through hell and then being flash frozen. It would sometimes cause me too pass out for hours, if I was unlucky, days even.

As I neared the place the elder had mentioned I began to hear strange roaring that I had only heard in one place. But it's best not to think about that now.

'So he isn't totally insane yet' I thought to myself. 'The elder did hear something with the barrel of a head he has.' I skidded to a dead stop when I smelled… dragon fire! It has a sort of distinct smell to it, like burning cherry wood with a tinge of apple spice mead. But only dragons can smell that; for me it brought back bad memories of the war.

I took off in that direction immediately, fearing the worst, and I got the worst. I had to swerve as an arrow nearly impaled my belly. It looked as though the elves had decided to move after the nests after all, and I had just plopped myself right in the middle of it.

I grimaced as multiple arrows pierced my scaled hide. Peeling off to the side to avoid their hungry little tips, I went to ask someone in charge if there is anything I could do to help. Looking back at the skirmish—no… battle—it was a lot bigger than I had first assumed. It spanned nearly into the whole forest and then some. What we had was nothing compared to the elves forces. I was actually surprised our guardians hadn't fallen yet.

It must have been about one hundred against one thousand. Yet we were holding strong, sort of. I couldn't find any sort of leader so I just decided to join in.

I hit the ground on all fours, crushing some of the horrid elves in my landing. Almost immediately two white haired elves jumped on my back, trying to get under my armor to get to soft skin underneath. I growled and rolled over, crushing them with my hard spines. I never did try to use fire on the elves for their wards would protect from any flames that are not constant. It's the heat that gets them, not the flames.

Then one of them slashed at my wings. I drew back, hissing at the pain, swinging my tail in the direction of the offending elf. He grabbed by tail when it swung by, digging his sword in, causing a rivulet of blood to hit me in the eye from being flung off the open wound on my tail. Now nearly blinded with a gaping hole in my wing, and one of those stupid elves hanging off of me, I decided that the ground wasn't a very good place to be at that time.

I took off, shaking my tail to shake the elf off. I was having a hard time getting off of the ground because every time I flapped my wings the hole in the leathery membrane became larger. Because of the slow takeoff. Another one of those idiots jumped and grabbed my hind leg.

"Averill Winther! You're coming with me one way or another, if I go down you are going down with me!"

I cut whatever tangent he was going off into with a short, loud roar. After I had gotten a few feet in the air, I looked back at the elf. He looked absolutely exhausted to the point that I expected him to just fall of and die right there and then. 'You aren't going to do anything to me in that state, you pitiful little fool. I don't care who you are, but I know one thing is for sure. Your body will be so mangled when I'm done with you not even your family will want to pay their last respects!' I sneered. All the elf did was smile and wink at me like he was up to something. 'Well not anymore,' I thought to myself. I snapped my tail like a slavers whip while twisting to break his grip. He easily came off like a dead scale. But the whole time he was falling he was smiling. And that infuriated me to the point of flying down to where he was falling just to finish the twerp off.

When I got near enough to hear him he said one phrase… "Waise neiat," and my world exploded. The pain was worse than the pain of changing. It was mostly centered on my back near where the elf was, but in that state he couldn't make that big of an explosion. I finally heard the wind in my ears and realized that I had to stabilize myself if I wanted to survive, but it was too late.

With a sickening crunch I heard myself hit the ground but I was beyond pain. I could only hear cheering and my lifeblood slowly leaking out of my body. The last thing I saw was a silver-haired elf standing over my head with a raised sword. Then I faded into the blackness of unconsciousness.

In a different place, in a different time

"We need a protector!" a feminine voice retorted to another hidden figure. "The hero will fall without one and then our race will be doomed! Do you really want that?"

"But who is this protector, may I ask?" This time a distinctly male voice answered. "Everyone in this time is either a slob or a rich idiot who don't know slag from pie! Face it! We are doomed! No one can help us… What is it…? I know that look, what is it you have you found?"

"Our protector can be the guardian of the dragons. The one that fell in the dragon elf war."

"You mean the shape changer? Why him?… I thought you didn't like shape changers. 'Too unpredictable' you called them. I also remembered something about them being a loose bowstring."

"I have enough power left to warp time to bring him where he is needed."

"But won't the elves reject him? He killed millions of their kind. How will that work out! And the energy requirements alone will kill you! You can't hope-"

The female cut him off. "Exactly why I told you what I was doing. To bid you farewell my brother," There was a snap and a distressed moan.

"You always have to go off on impossible missions by yourself, don't you little sister?… You and that teleport."

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><p><strong>Thank you so much StarrFlower for helping me rewrite the first chapter. The original was an abomination that needed to be bludgeoned into shape. <strong>


	2. Chapter 1

**Disclamer: I do not own Christopher Paolini's magical books or characters. I just frolic in his world messing with people (squirrel!)**

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><p>Thousands of small, tan tents surrounded the city of Feinster, occasional bouts of smoke coming from the decimated trade city. A huge burial pyre stood just outside the encampment, smoldering slowly as the thousands of soldiers slept, trying to recover from the recent battle. They had lost many the day before, and were unprepared for the surprise that was coming their way.<p>

Eragon woke to screams. Not screams of surprise, but the blood curdling screams of horror or terror. He was still tired, so he didn't bother to check if it was horror or terror either. There was an audible thump as Eragon's head fell back onto the rancid smelling pillow, but he didn't mind. He had beauty sleep to catch up on. Then, one of those messengers burst through the flap of his tent.

"Madam Angela is in need of your magic abilities at this moment! She will need your help, and soon!" The messenger quickly bolted the opposite way he had come and hurtled left down the foot trodden road.

Eragon raised his head and released a drawn out moan. He could tell the messenger was distressed in a way a mouse would be before a falcon. This was only confirmed when there was a sudden screech and someone's shadow turning around very quickly from the left side of his tent. Peering under his tent flap he saw the messenger bolt the exact opposite way he had just gone.

Rolling over he spotted a scaly, sapphire tail snaking into the tent. 'Saphira should probably know of this' Eragon thought to himself, making up his mind about waking up the she-dragon. Having a very good chance of being irritable when being forcefully woken up, Eragon still reached to prod the reptilian tail.

'What's all this ruckus about?' Saphira removed her tail from its position before Eragon could do anything but stare at where it used to lay.

Eragon sighed and started drawing in the dirt. 'Angela needs our help-' He was cut off by a loud, surprised snort and an ensuing thump of heavy footfalls. A few moments later the dragoness stuck her head in.

'Did you say Angela… needs our help?!' She cocked her head in a questioning pose and prodded her Rider for more information. 'She never needs help!'

Eragon gently shoved her head away. "Angela was desperate enough to send a messenger, I doubt she is trying to fool us." He began scratching Saphira behind her jaw thoughtfully, electing a pleased hum from her. "I guess we should probably check."

Stopping his scratching, he began to move around getting some more suitable clothes on while Saphira stared at the roof of the tent, very obviously in deep thought.

She moved her head out of the tent and sat up, looking over the tents to see what was wrong in the world at this moment. Letting out a startled snort, Saphira got up from her sitting position. 'Eragon, you should see this. Don't even bother trying to put some decent clothes on. No one will look even remotely in your direction.'

Now curious as to why that would be, he went out into the bright day that seemed intent on blinding him. Climbing onto Saphira and mincing slightly up her neck, he stared out into the forest of tan and other brown colors of the Varden's tents.

"What the hell is that?" Eragon had managed to spot the strange object that had gotten everyone panicked. Said object seemed to have the general shape of a man and was falling right for a rare patch of trees by the encampment.

'Well why don't we find out? What's the worst that could happen?' With a titanic beat of her huge wings, they were up in the air and speeding to the falling man, forgetting that they did not have a saddle, or Eragon's shirt and shoes, nor did they make it in time to slow his fall. With a thunderous crash, the stranger hit the trees. The resulting bang of him hitting the ground seemed to echo for miles in Eragon's ears. He really did not want to go near that site, for he had seen enough blood yesterday at the battle of the Burning Plains. Oddly enough, Saphira seemed to agree with him. Whatever that man was, he had been flattened like an ant. He could tell them nothing about how he came to be falling from the sky, and who—or what—he had offended to get in that position.

What they both did not expect was the resulting cry of "He's alive!" from one of the Varden. He was the only one who had been brave enough to get anywhere near the smoking and battered man. That immediately changed both Eragon and Saphira's mind about going near the ominous crater. When Saphira managed to get near the tree patch and make a quick landing, Eragon immediately vaulted off her back and took off towards the man, finding that Angela had beaten them to it.

"How did you get here so fast? The man only just hit the ground," Eragon exclaimed. Angela decided to ignore that comment and continue what she was doing. Eragon just shook his head and decided that he would never understand how that woman did anything. He went for a better look as Saphira lumbered over. The man who had fallen was a pale young man who looked to be about the same age as Eragon. He was wearing a tattered brown cloak that somehow still covered his head, light brown pants, and seemed to have close fitting gloves with metal curved around the knuckles. His boots had seen better days and everything was soaked thoroughly with blood. The only thing really off was a strange symbol of a dragon burned into his chest. Eragon went to remove his hood to get a better look at his face, but Angela stopped him.

"Now, we wouldn't want the whole camp in and uproar, would we?" Angela said with a mischievous glint in her eye. She moved to cover his face with her body so the camp couldn't see his face, and then removed his hood. The sight Eragon saw elicited a gasp from him and a grunt of surprise from Saphira, who was currently breathing down his neck. The man was an elf! No wonder why Angela covered his face. The people of the Varden were already wary of Eragon because he looked like an elf, but they kept off his case because he used to be fully human. He didn't know how the Varden would react to an actual elf, besides Arya, in the encampment.

"How bad are his wounds?" Eragon questioned Angela. "Do you need me to heal him?" The herbalist gave a firm nod and proceeded to flip the male elf onto his belly, covering up his face with the torn hood in the process. The elf had what looked to be vicious claw wounds running in a crisscross pattern on his back, like a dragon had tried to grab him. He was scarred numerous times on his body. Wherever this elf had come from, he had seen his fair share of combat. Eragon set to work healing his back, sometimes having to use some of the healing spells that Oromis had taught him for marks that had ripped the muscle. Eventually, Eragon managed to get his back into passable shape for Angela to finish up. But in doing so, he exhausted himself to the point where he had to lean against Saphira in order to stand up.

"Tell me when he wakes, would you? He still needs some healing and I want to know where he came from." Eragon then noticed something peculiar about his swords. He had originally thought them to be inconsequential plain steel swords, but after a second look (and a lot of sniffing on Saphira's part), he realized that the sheaths were far too elaborate for any common blades.

'Eragon!' Saphira cried, 'those are Rider swords… He has killed elves with those blades! I can smell the blood on them.' An earth shattering growl subconsciously rumbled from the she dragon. Eragon just gave a confused look and bent down to grab the swords and their sheaths. They were even more elaborate than his own! Whomever this elf had killed, they must have been revered as a Rider. Or perhaps he had stolen them from a noble. He guessed the latter and proceeded to unsheathe the dual blades.

They were a dark shade of purple, almost black, and they had simple cross guards with two amethysts on each side, and one large square one on the end of the hilt. Their names were Lifs Istalri and Gedwëy Garm (Life's Flame and Shining Wolf). Eragon decided to keep them instead of putting them in the armory for safekeeping. He wanted to inspect them more and see if there was anything of the old Rider left in those swords.

Angela just seemed to notice that he had said something. "Aye, should only be about a day! Also if he dies, don't come and pick him up. Solembum's hungry."

Eragon proceeded to choke on the stale piece of bread he had found in his pocket. "What did you just say?" he managed to force out of his overfilled mouth.

"Oh, you just don't have any sense of humor in you, do you? Nor does Saphira, it would seem," Angela chuckled darkly. Said dragon had gone stock still and was slowly flexing her claws.

'Saphira let's get out of here and leave Angela to her work. I think she needs it.' Eragon began shoving Saphira (to the best of his ability) towards the open space around the trees.

'Yes, let's do that,' the irritated she-dragon grumbled. 'And on the way I want to see what Solembum's doing. Besides, Nasuada wants you at her pavilion. A page ran up while you were healing the elf and told me. She wants to know about the elf.'

Eragon just sighed "Why can't I ever get any sleep!" he complained to his dragon, and then sighed again. He vaulted onto Saphira and gave her a pat on the side of her muscular neck to signal he was secure. Jumping into the air, the dragoness headed at an even pace towards the pavilion where Nasuada was currently residing. Now that the distraction was gone, the Varden's populace flooded back into the camp like a river, resulting in Saphira not having any place to land for around an hour. But the dragon and Rider were fine with circling around the middle of the encampment. It was peaceful except for the occasional "Hail Shadeslayer," and "Brightscales!" But those were mostly ignored in favor of enjoying the sky for a little bit.

Eventually the ground cleared enough for the sapphire dragoness to land near the pavilion. With a dull thud, she hit the ground before the guards, startling them immensely. As Eragon slid off his dragon, one of the guards stationed near the tent flap stepped forward.

"Halt," he barked. "State your business."

"Nasuada asked for me to report on the recent happenings." Eragon shifted his weight onto his left foot, irritated that they had to call the leader and ask if his presence was allowed. Eragon turned to Saphira who had opted to just go and lay down near her flap to stick her head in. 'Couldn't Nasuada have called me later rather than immediately? I mean look at me!' He gestured to his naked chest. 'I was barely ready for any of this.' Saphira decided not to say anything and left the Rider fuming with his own thoughts. Fortunately, they were not allowed to simmer for long and Eragon's thoughts were interrupted when Nasuada stuck her head out of the flap.

"Ah! There you are. You sure took your time with getting here. Well… What are you waiting for, get in and spill!" Ushering a very surprised Eragon into the massive tent, she hustled over to a spare chair in the room. "While you have been out there messing around, I've had to make do with these people." She gestured to the farmers taking the rest of the wooden chairs. "Now shoo, Eragon and I must speak in peace." Regaining a more formal tone to her voice, Nasuada turned to face the Dragon Rider. "Well?"

Eragon sighed and moved to sit in one of the vacant chairs, "What you heard from those farmers was probably true." Looking down at his feet, he slowly said, "I have no idea how he got here or who he was. The only thing I know is he was, or stole, from a Rider and he was in some sort of battle and was badly hurt."

"Stole from? Where's the evidence."

With a sharp metallic rattle, Eragon withdrew the dual blades that he had scavenged from the stranger's unconscious body. "These are a Rider's swords. They are made with almost the exact composition as my own. But I have not heard these swords anywhere in my teachings, nor anything that I have overheard in these past few months." He stretched an arm out offering a singular blade to Nasuada.

She immediately snatched it and inspected the blade for herself. "Why is it so light, Eragon? It's just a little heavier than my own knife."

"Those are secrets best left alone and only known by select few. My own sword is no different with weight and strength," Eragon replied. "It was made with the same material that my own blade is. But the only thing that marks this apart is that Saphira notices the slight smell of elf blood on it."

Nasuada stopped her inspection to give Eragon a slightly shocked look, like she had found a live fish in her dish. "So that would mark that he has killed elves? He was a traitor to his kind then… Maybe we should ask Arya about this matter. She would know more then you or me."

"Aye," Eragon agreed. "She was naturally born an elf. There may be some lore about these blades. There are not many people that kill elves and survive, and even though he is an elf, they are a vengeful race and will not forget him lightly."

Nasuada straightened up and called for a nearby messenger. "Go and fetch Arya, she should be near the west side of our encampment. Tell her that we have an urgent matter on our hands and need her help." As the page took off out of the tent she turned to Eragon. "What condition was he in when you found him? I heard he was falling from the heavens."

"In a way," Eragon agreed. "But the angle that he was falling from led me to believe that he was knocked from whatever beast he was riding. It was more diagonal then just straight down. He was heavily injured when he hit the ground."

"Do we have an estimate on when he will wake up? Angela is healing him with her toadstools I presume?" She glanced over at Eragon from the map she was studying. "Was there anything suspicious other than the swords?"

Saphira decided to speak up, tired of being ignored. 'There was an off looking symbol that seemed to be burned into his chest. It was about the size of a large coin, just above the abdomen. Before you ask, I have already checked my memories for anything like it.' She then looked at Nasuada and gave a hiccup of laughter that sounded like the grating of two bricks, seeing that the woman was hyperventilating at her sudden addition to the conversation. Noticing the dragon and Rider staring at her she immediately composed herself.

"My apologies Saphira, I didn't notice you and thought you were out hunting or resting, seeing that it is early in the morning." She gave a little formal bow and moved back to her map. She then looked up and smiled, noticing that Arya had entered the pavilion. "There you are, we don't have anything terribly urgent, and currently we just needed some of your knowledge on elven folklore."

She didn't respond to Nasuada's smile and simply moved to one of the chairs farthest from Eragon, who had moved to go and lay against one of his dragon's scaly forelegs. After she was settled the elf nodded towards Nasuada. "I will help where I can."

"We have found on the body of the person that recently crashed into our camp some swords that Eragon has identified as elven. But Saphira has noticed the smell of your kind's blood on these blades." The last sentence that Nasuada said immediately snapped Arya out of the disapproving frown she had carried the whole time she was in the large tent. It was instead replaced with a look of curiosity, now believing that the time coming here had not been wasted.

"May I see them Nasuada?" Said woman nodded to Eragon, signaling him to hand the blades to Arya. He put the dual blades back into their respective sheaths and got up to hand them to Arya. Placing one of them by her side, she proceeded to rapidly pull it out of its scabbard. But what happened next was unexpected to everyone except Saphira, who had decided to take to a nap and did not notice what had happened to Arya.

She belted out a scream that could have been compared to a small bird being crushed and then ground into paste, while still alive. The elf dropped the sword as if it had suddenly become a large snake and backed away from it and huddled into a corner, curled into a small ball as if there were demons attacking her. She then began to pitifully whimper while rocking back and forth. Unbeknownst to the two other people in the room, she was having flashbacks of the memories passed down from her mother when she asked how her great grandfather had died.

All elves knew of the Deceiver. The tales of how he had murdered thousands of the elves race were passed down from generation to generation ever since the war between the elves and the dragons. But even all of the things the dragons had done were forgotten after peace was made. But he was not forgotten, and he would never be for one simple reason. He was neither elf nor dragon… but an unholy combination of both of them. That one shape changer had caused enough grief among the elves to last a millennium. And how his purple blades made by the banished elven blacksmith caused their blood to fall in rivers was used to scare their children to sleep. He was an elves version of the boogey man.

Averill was right in the middle of the Varden's camp left unguarded. And he wanted his swords back.

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><p><strong>Thanks for all the help Naerys Targaryen! For being an awesome Beta!<strong>

**If you want anything to happen to this story PM me. I will see if I can stick it in there somewhere. **


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